There is a little buzz in the media air courtesy of the mouth, Jeremy Roenick. In the Versus post game, Jeremy Roenick commented about Patrick Marleau’s game as a “gutless, GUTLESS performance by Marleau tonight. But we’ll talk about that later.” Pavel Datsyuk did make Marleau look a bit foolish before the dynamic Russian fed the puck to Nicklas Lidstrom who, courtesy of fellow Stromtrooper, Tomas Holmstrom and his patented deflection, scored to put the Wings up 4-3 in the third period. Here is the video.

This is actually old news. Roenick has never cared for Marleau, though they were teammates during Jeremy’s brief stint in San Jose. From last season’s playoffs and the mouth, after the Sharks dropped game one to the Avalanche:

“When’s Patty Marleau gonna come out and hit somebody in a playoff game?” Roenick asked incredulously. “When is he gonna come out and start showing why he was so good in the regular season? Not just scoring goals, but playing physical and being emotional in a playoff round. Look at the way Shane Doan came out in Game 1 against Detroit. He hit everything that he could possibly get his hands on to show his team how they need to play. When is Patrick Marleau going to do that in a playoff round?”

So…yeah…not exactly love in the air.

But, does Jeremy Roenick have a right to call anyone or anything gutless or question another NHL player’s on ice performance? If you asked LA Kings’ fans, the answer would be a resounding hell no.

Remember this is the same Jeremy Roenick that signed with the LA Kings, was paid 5 million dollars (some would call “stole”), came into the season completely out of shape and then half assed it throughout while blaming his skates and everything else for his lack of effort. Who can forget his comment thereafter where he admitted to giving “60 percent” out there.

So, whether you agree with JR or not, I think we can all agree that the title “hypocrite” can be added to his post NHL resume.

8 replies

Journalists are asking whether JR crossed the line? What a laugh! When JR played, everybody loved his candor, called it refreshing and never dull when he spoke.

So he calls out a notorious playoff stiff and all of a sudden, people are worried about whether feeling are hurt? Now days, a person with any kind of celebrity can’t pick his nose without some goof using it as a lead “news” item. Propriety in journalism and news reporting is non existent.

Yes, “Bobby Scribe,” JR has every right to call someone out. At least he “played” the game and is not just an observer giving a take based on “what he thinks goes on” during the course of a game, both inside the dressing room and on the ice.

Perspective is important though. LA Kings’ fans find JR commenting about anyone’s performance as gutless or less than good faith as comical given his own admitted failure to put in any reasonable effort while here, while making millions. Essentially – that is the same criticism he offers Marleau. For what it’s worth, I am not nor have I ever been a fan of PM

It probably wouldn’t be controversial if he was right. A few plays where he underestimated a really good player is not what I’d consider gutless. I sense some bad blood that was carried over from when they were teammates, and Roenick using a public forum to lash out. It’s not like JR lead them to anything more than a melt down when he played with them.

I’m not sure Jr isn’t right. You can question the format in which he did it-lack of class? Maybe. Wrong, I don’t know.

You can certainly question Jr’s stint with the Kings but I don’t think you can argue with his body of work. I hated him as a King, but I admired him for most his career. He has more right to speak than any of us, in my opinion.

JR will never get much affection from Kings’ fans given what he did–or did not do–here. I don’t care what he did the rest of his career–he was such a disgrace here that his past or present arrogance is intolerable. I just can’t see it any other way.

Now, it looks like he probably has something personal with Marleau, and that may be a factor in his “commentary”. Regardless, I don’t think he has much credibility and I would rather see someone else sitting in his chair during the playoff games…